CHAPTER XIV 



SCIENCE AND POLITICS (1872-1874) 



(Age 38-40) 



In the year 1872 came to an end the rather 

 patriarchal mode of life at High Elms, which had 

 still included several of the younger brothers, 

 under the roof of the eldest, as well as his own 

 young and growing family. It was a year further 

 notable in Sir John Lubbock's history as being 

 that in which he commenced his studies in the 

 intelligence of Ants. For that type of all popular 

 ignorance, " the man in the street," the name of 

 Sir John Lubbock is associated, in the first in- 

 stance, no doubt, with the Bank Holidays, but 

 in the second with the " Ants, Bees, and Wasps," 

 about which he published a very delightful and 

 widely-read volume a little later. The idea of 

 this man of business and of legislature poring 

 over the small and hurrying insects struck the 

 fancy of the people by its apparent paradox. 

 It gave them one idea the more of the extra- 

 ordinarily varied outlook and interest of this 

 gifted man, who was himself of a remarkably 

 ant-like industry. 



Napoleon III., then living at Chislehurst, 

 came to High Elms in the spring to see Sir John's 



135 



